Thousands of miles east of European Russia,the Jewish
Autonomous Region was founded in 1934 as a "homeland" for Soviet Jews.
Given the objectives of the Soviet government at the time, this distant outpost seemed a perfect location.

Early attempts by the government to relocate the Jews to the Crimea and Ukraine had
ended with a severe local backlash. To avoid local opposition the government chose
an area where there weren't any locals. Unfortunately for the Jewish
migrants, there was a good reason why virtually nobody lived in this region: the winters are
extremely harsh, the roads were practically nonexistent, and the land was swampy.

Influenced by an effective propoganda campaign, and starvation in the east, 41,000 Soviet Jews relocated to the area
between the late 1920s and early 1930s. But, by 1938 28,000 of them had fled the regions harsh conditions,
There were Jewish schools and synagogues up until the 1940's, when there was a
A resurgence of religious repression after World War II. The Jewish population was essentially
inactive until the late 1980s an early 1990s, when there was something of a revival in
Birobidzhan.

Today, students can take Hebrew and Yiddish lessons, as well as Jewish culture classes at
schools and two institutes in town. Most of the Jewish population has left for Israel, Europe
or the US, and by some estimates only 3,000 Jews remain in Birobidzhan.